LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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Jon— 18G.5 to 1871. 



SPEECH 



fflLLARD WARNER, 



OF ALABAMA, 



DELIVERED 



IN THE SENATE OF TIIE UNITED STATES 



MARCH 3, 1871. 



WASHINGTON: 
F. & J. RIVES & GEO. A. BAILEY, 

REPORTERS AND PRINTERS OF TIIE DEBATES OF CONGRESS. 

1871. 



Rc-Conslructioii — 1860 to 1S71. 



The Senate having under consideration the fol- 
lowing amendment, proposed by Mr. Warner, to 
nt resolution (II. II. No. 521) repealing the 
duty on coal : 

And that all political disabilities imposed by law 
or by the Constitution of the United Slates upon 
citizens of the United States on account of rebellion 
are hereby removed — 

Mr. WARNER said: 

Mr. President: He who would approach 
the discussion or treatment of a great ques- 
tion of Government, involving the welfare of a 

large portion of the people, in a purely partisan 
spirit or with any other intent than to state the 
truth as he sees it. and to act as his best 
judgment and conscience dictate, is unworthy 
to be a citizen of a free country, much less to 
be an A.raerican Senator. 

I hold my allegiance to truth and country 
far above my obligation to party, f support 
and act with a great political party, because 
that party is an instrumentality through which 
I can serve my country and humanity. Seven- 
teen years ago 1 aided in organizing the Repub- 
lican party, as an agency through which might 
be wrought out certain great and noble ends, 
isl among which were the immediate 
limitation and ultimate eradication of human 
untry. It became in the hands 
of Providence the instrumentality through 
i gigantic rebellion, inaugurated to sus- 
tain and perpetuate shivery through a divis- 
ion of the country, was crushed, the territorial 
v of the Republic maintained, and the 
equality of rights of men established. And 
now, while I may criticise some of its acts, I 
am profoundly convinced that its future suc- 
cess is absolutely necessary to the safety and 
well-being of the; country. 

TRUE CONDITION OF I: I [ON. 

The main (and 1 may say almost the only) 
eis urged against the plan of 
Btruction adopted by Congress, are : first, thai 
the colored men were allowed to vote; and 
secondly, that a small class of those engaged 
in rebellion shouid not I 



of the State conventions to frame new consti- 
tutions for the rebel States; and thirdly, that 
this same class should not be eligible to any 
office except by authority of two thirds of 
Congress. The two first-named features were 
contained in the act of Congress of March 2, 
1867, •' for the more efficient government of 
the rebel States." which provided as follows: 
"That when the people of any one of said n : el 
States shall have formed a constitution of govern- 
ment in conformity with the Constitution of the 
United States in all respects, framed by a convention 
of delegates elected by the male citizens of said 
State, twenty-one years old and upward, of what- 
ever race, color, or previous condition, who havo 
been resident in said State for one year previous to 
the day of such cl< ction, except such as may be dis- 
franchised for participation in the rebellion, or for 
felony at common law; and when such constitution 
shall provide that the elective franchise shall be 
enjoyed by all such persons > qualifica- 

1 tions hereiif stated lor electors oi ; and 

J when such constitution shall be ratified by a majority 
of the persons voting on the question of ratification 
who are qualified as clec oi i for delegates; and 
such constitution shall have b ted to Con- 

fer examination and approval, and Coi 
shall have approved the same; and when sai i Si I . 
by a vote of its Legislature, elected undi r il coi 
stitution, shall have adopted the amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States proposed by the 
Thirty-Ninth Con n lown as article ioui 

teen : and ivhen iid arl iclc - ha 1 1 ha ( o become a 
pat t of the Constitution ol the Uniti I SI I . i I 
State shall be declat ■ i i otitic I to representation in 
Congress, and and B ita 

be admi irn on t heir i a 

scribed by law : end then and thereafter the 

■ rat i vi in 
Si n ;.■:/' n excluded from iUh 

privilege of holding 

men t to the Constitution of the United Stal in I 
be eligible to election as a member of the con 1 
to frame a State constitution for anj 

States r shall any such person vote lor members 

of such convention." 

The third-named objection was founded on 
the pr-'. ision in sec 
amendment : ■ 
States, as follows : 

" Xo pen on ih n II be a £ 

i r o f Pr i 
e ent, or hold an otTi :e, civil or in 

tes, or tving pre- 

iously taken an i 

any State La i Executive or judi- 



cial officer of any State, to support the Constitution 
of the United States, shall havo engaged in insur- 
rection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or 
comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, 
by a vote of two thirds of each House, remove such 
disability." 

These features form the basis of all the argu- 
ment against the policy of the Government 
toward the communities lately in rebellion 
and of all the partisan clamor about ven- 
geance and tyranny and oppression. The 
statement of the simple, plain fact that these 
provisions of law and Constitution contain all 
of punishment or deprivation ever imposed 
on those lately engaged in rebellion against 
the Government proves the utter groundless- 
ness of such clamor, because it proves the 
unparalleled liberality of the Government. 

Sir, looking back over the way which we 
have come for the past six years, I am fully 
convinced that universal suffrage was the wisest 
solution of the great political problem which 
confronted the country at the end of the war, 
namely, what to do with the South. I only 
regret that it was not at once ordained, and 
that general amnesty for the rebellion was not 
extended with it. In the then condition of 
the public mind at the South, both would have 
been promptly and kindly accepted ; the best 
men of the South would have at once taken 
hold of the work of reconstruction, and taking 
the iguorant but honest and kindly slave by 
the hand, the South would have risen, phenix- 
like, from the ashes of her ruin, and we 
should have been spared many of the painful 
events of the years since the war, and much 
of the ill-feeling which unhappily prevails to- 
day. General Grant struck the key-note of 
true reconstruction, and showed the wisdom 
of the statesman as well as the generosity of 
the soldier, when he said to Lee and his army, 
"Go harmless for the past, on condition you 
obey the laws in future." 

EFFECTS OF DELAY AND OF DISABILITIES. 

But when the late rebels found that there 
was to be no punishment for rebellion, and 
were induced by a faithless President to believe 
that they should be returned to full political 
power as before, and when the passions of the 
war which had been hushed in the hour of 
defeat had been kindled into life and activity 
by a conflict between the President and Con- 
gress, in which the President told the people 
of the South that Congress sought to impose 
conditions of restoration in a spirit of ven- 
geance, it was proposed to them to divide the 
power, which they were just eagerly clutching, 
with the late slaves, the effect was to consol- 
idate the white men against the system proposed 
by Congress, and to leave a few bold friends 
of the Government and of equal rights to fight 
the battle alone with the aid of the newly 
enfranchised race. While the friends of con- 
gressional reconstruction were successful in 
carrying the elections, the result was that very 
many places of power and responsibility, which 
required for the proper discharge of the duties 



thereof courage, integrity, and high capacity, 
were sought and obtained by men lacking in 
all these essential qualities. As a further re- 
sult have followed failures and corruptions in 
office, and as a consequence of these, still fur- 
ther prejudice and bitter feeling among those 
who have been opposed to the Government. 
This ill-feeling was deepened among the more 
sensitive and ambitious of the late rebels by 
finding themselves disabled from holding any 
office, and they desired to see a system fail 
which gave their late slaves rights which were 
denied to them. 

UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE TIIE TRUE PRINCIPLE OF FREE 
GOVERNMENT. 

The action of Congress in establishing uni- 
versal suffrage as the basis of reconstruction has 
been much criticised and complained of, but 
in my judgment this requirement was both wise 
and just. All concede that intelligence and 
property should have a voice in free govern- 
ment. Wealth is almost universally allied with 
intelligence. The right of the ignorant, who 
are almost universally poor, to political rights, 
is alone denied, for but few now are disposed 
to place the denial of the ballot to the negro 
solely to the account of his color. Any effect- 
ive educational qualification, applicable to all 
classes at the South, would have been odious, 
for it would not only have excluded nearly all 
the negroes, but many thousands of white men; 
in Alabama alone from twenty to thirty thou- 
sand. I maintain that the ballot is peculiarly 
and imperatively necessary to the poor and 
the ignorant for their safety and well-being 
and for the good of the State. The classes 
who have wealth and brains and education, or 
any of them, can protect themselves. It is 
poverty and ignorance that need to be armed 
with the ballot, and covered with the shield of 
the law's equality. 

THE BALLOT TIIE ONLY HOPE OF THE NEGRO. 

To have denied the negro equal political 
rights would have left him in a condition of 
vassalage and degradation nearly as helpless 
as slavery itself. Liberty, with all the avenues 
of hope, ambition, and progress closed to 
him, would have been but half a blessing, 
while the most powerful incentive to effort and 
improvement, and the most direct interest of 
the State to educate him, would have been 
lacking. The exercise of the right of suffrage, 
and the respect and consequence which it gives, 
are among the most powerful agencies at work 
for his elevation and improvement. This is 
the law of nature, that exercise and growth are 
indissolubly linked to each other. The smith's 
arm grows strong by use, while the arm in the 
sling withers and wastes. The brain is quick- 
ened, enlarged, and strengthened by use ; the 
doing a thing most quickly learns how to do it 
well ; the use of a tool begets facility and skill 
in its use ; the exercise of the right of suffrage 
leads to thought how to vote, whom to vote 
for, the consideration of men and measures, 
the desire and habit of reading, the listening 



to speeches and discussions; and thus contin- 
ually are men enlightened and stimulated to 
efforl and education. Without th 

an i the pauper, and the oppressive 
\ laws, which disgraced the statute- 
books of many of the southern States under 
the Johnson system of reconstruction, which 
confined political rights to white men. would 
not have been so speedily, if' ever, swepl 
away, but would rather have been madi 
stringent. In short, without the ballot, the 
al the South would still, as of old, have 
had no rights which white men would have fell 
bound to re-pee! . 

You may see the power of wealth and intel- 
ligence in the dominating infl lence of t 1 
corporations of the country, which threaten to 
so overshadow the land thai a member of the 
•'.ire of a greal State, with biting sar- 
casm, moved that the body adjourn, provided 
isident of a irporation had. no 

further business tor them to do. Hut who shall 
for the poor, the weak, and the ignorant 
if they have no votes? 

1 venture I here what I said in the 

i lution submitting the 6 I 
amendment to the States fur i I 

"Knowledge is power. Wealth is power. The 

learned a ice I t he ba He! ['or their 

ion. The greal farmer who has his three to 

laboi i a power and influence which 

no law can takeaway. It isle- landless and depend- 

ent tenants, in their cabins and in their ignorance, 

i ball it for their safety. The millionaire 

in his money, and the man of education in his 

knowledge and his brain, have each a power in 

governm rthanahund , a i«nvw 

( lonstitul ion neil her gives nor c 
away, it is the poor, unlearned man. who h 

he ballot, i o whom it i> l ] heritage, 

a protection a nd a shield." * 

" W bile no man put be value 

of intelligence in the people than 1 do, and while 
no one would do more than I would to encourage 
the education of the masses, I i it is the 

disfranchisement and oppression of the poor and the 
ignorant which it is our duty to guard against. In 
p lor and the unlearned yen are pro- 
tecting the great laboring, industrial classes of the 
c >un1 ry. It : made yourState, who 

have felled year forests, worked your min . dug 
rials, built your habitations and churches and 
and en lieges, laid year railroads, made 

your engines and your implements, beautified and 
adorned and m nt your homes, tilled your 

soil and tilled your granaries, and enl with resist- 

i he arteries of 

proud rank anion:: the nations. Their brawny arms 
ae.d strong sinews bave wrought out. our wealth; 
upon thi 

ibri t our Republic, il - government, its I; , 
institutions, its civilization. Their stoul .inn- hear 
forward the car of j rhtedwith the high- 

nun , and i 

■ 
toil have allowed them no opportunities of edu- 
cation. 

drift of modern civilization is 

toward a larger and larger enfi of the 

iur end is a pure democracy. Let us 

. . 

will have no disfrnnchi I ted, clamoring 

- ready and ripe for tut 
and revolution. Then the 

and peacefully expressed, will bave a weighl and a 
pov. ir which will command and insure universal 

" We are relaying the very corner-stone of our tem- 



ple of libert: . Lr< I us see that its proportions aro 

1 a mple, and its material indi 
tible. Our fat hers laid the foundation of our Govern- 
menl upon the reel; of truth and juste-, when they 
i to the world, in 1 heir immortal 1 >ccla ra- 
i ion, that 'all n made so 

by law- an 1 Creator; but 

they built ba lly, though perhaps of necessity, when 
i bey countenanced ■ la\ ery in the pr 
ing to fugitives. Let us p ror, a n 1 

i igllty year-', 
and warned bj ■ ri do retri- 

bution which surely and inevitably follow com- 
promisi of truth anil justice, follow our principles 

to t heir logical i lit i m and found this nat ion 

on the rock of universal equal human rigti 
settling forever i ho w bich, neve: 

aright, have risen again and again to disturb, and 
finally to ll land." 

\ \\\, REFORM I i I 

By reconstructi m is gen i ant the 

work of restoring the lately rebellious States 
to their normal legal relations to the Govern- 
ment. But the problem which con: 
the patriotic, wis?' statesman at the end of 

the late war. was a deeper and mon 
Cull one than merely how or when to admit 
the rebel States to representation in Congress, 
and in the Electoral College. The Govern- 
ment had successfully fought, a great war, end 
had conquered submission on the part of its 
enemi s. How. in the hour of victory and in 
the flush of passion, to make peace wisely; 
how to hush to perpetual slumber the animos- 
ities which created the war, and which had been 
greatly deepened by it; how to guard against 
future rebellion: how to protect in their lib- 
erty and rights four million human I 
all poor, and nearly all ignorant, wdio had been 
fre d from slavery, and ilius deprived of such 
protection and care as interest always giv - ; 
how to eradicate from the public mind of ihe 
whole country, the poison of prejudice and 

proscription which slavery had infused : how 
to lay anew the foundations of civil liberty and 
political equality, excluding the unjust dis- 
tinctions which the toleration id' the enslave- 
ment of a portion of th;- people of the country 
had made possible and practical; how to meet 
the vast financial obligations of" the Govern- 
ment — these were the great, questions which 
were involved in reconstructing a Government 
which had been sadly shaken and broken by 
the tearing up of a great evil, wines- ro 
tended over the whole length and breadth of 
id, and were under the very foundations 
of the Government. ^ 

With what was done, and with the now uni- 
versally-admitted evil coi sof the dis- 
'! an accidental President 
are too painfully familiar to 
tiei -1 recital. [lad there been earm 
bold unity in anj policy not inconsistent 
-. many if not most of the 
appalling evils which now afflict the southern 
i much mitigated, if not 
altogether avoided. But President Johnson, 
after having helped to give direction to the 
loyal mind of the country by declaring that, a 
v.-ide distinction must be made between rebels 
and Union men, and that the rebels must tako 



6 



back seats, and that he would be the Moses 
who should lead the late bondsmen from the 
wilderness and deserts of slavery, into the 
promised land of liberty and peace, suddenly 
changed his ground, and became the champion 
of a plan of reconstruction which contemplated 
no punishment or deprivation for rebellion, and 
no guarantee of protection or political rights to 
the colored race. 

One is not entitled to much credit for sagacity 
or statesmanship for seeing now, in the light of 
past events, what ought to have been done at 
the close of the war. Yet I may be pardoned 
for saying, I am fully convinced that if uni- 
versal suffrage, universal amnesty, universal 
education, and obedience to the laws had been 
made, by the united action of Congress and 
the President, the corner stones and conditions 
of reconstruction and restoration, we would 
now have substantial peace and prosperity at the 
South and throughout the country. 

Amnesty for rebellion would have secured 
the good will and cooperation of a great body 
of the white people of the South, and security 
and protection of the negro would have been 
secured by this result, and by makingthese the 
conditions of amnesty to the whites. 

EFFECT OF PROSCRIPTION AND POLITICAL DIS- 
ABILITIES. 

Like begets like. Proscription on one side 
prompts proscription on the opposite side. Bit- 
terness excites bitterness in return. Tolera- 
tion toward others tends to produce toleration 
toward those who exercise it. Through all 
the ages of human life soft words have turned 
away wrath, and thus it will ever be while 
human nature remains unchanged. But if pro- 
scription on account of rebellion had been 
wise, the rule adopted in the fourteenth amend- 
ment was not a wise or a just one, for many 
of the best Union men of the South were pro- 
scribed by it, while many of the most active 
and vehement secessionists escaped its effects. 

That a man had held office under the United 
States before the war, was an evidence of the 
good will and confidence of his people and of 
his influence among them, but not of his hav- 
ing been a promoter of rebellion against the 
Government; nor do I think that the fact of 
his having taken a formal oath to support the 
Constitution of the United Stales, added much, 
if any, to his obligation to support the Gov- 
ernment., or to his guilt in opposing it. Alle- 
giance inheres in citizenship, and oaths never 
have, and never will have, any force to check 
revolutions. Under our Constitution you can 
legally hang a man for treason against the Gov- 
ernment, though he has not taken an oath of 
allegiance to it, and you cannot do more if 
he has. If you felt that safety and justice 
demanded some measure of proscription, then 
you should have been careful to proscribe 
your enemies and not your friends. To have 
accomplished this result it would have been 
better to have disqualified for a time from 
holding office those who had been the original 
promoters of secession and rebellion, as shown 



by their votes. But my experience and care- 
ful observation for the past six years have con- 
firmed the conviction which I held at the close 
of the war, that political disabilities have been 
the source of injury and not good to the Gov- 
ernment and its friends, and that the day of 
peace has been postponed and not hastened by 
their imposition; and such is the general 
opinion among intelligent, thoughtful P ub- 
licans in the South. 

DENIAL OF JUSTICE TO SOUTHERN UNION MEN. 

A powerful reason for the weakness of the 
Government party in the South is to be found 
in the refusal of Congress to place loyal claim- 
ants in the rebellious States on the same foot- 
ing of loyal men in loyal States, on the ground 
that they are constructive enemies of the Gov- 
ernment, because living inside of territorial lim- 
its, within which, for a time, the public enemy 
had control. Though the Senate has taken 
action looking to a remedy for this wrong, yet 
as that action has not yet become law. and as 
thisdoctrine of constructive treason and public 
enemies, as applied to loyal citizens of our own 
country, is, in my judgment, so monstrously 
wrong, so repugnant to the natural judgment 
and conscience of the human heart, so opposed 
to the promise which was held out by the Gov- 
ernment and its friends during the great strug- 
gle, and so suggestive of mischievous conse- 
quences in the future, I cannot, in justice to 
myself and my constituents, refrain from saying 
a few words on the subject. 

Admitting, if you please, that the inhabitants 
of an enemy's country have no rights of prop- 
erty which the conqueror is bound to respect, 
1 deny that the docirine applies to this case. 
The South was not an enemy's country. Ene- 
mies there were in it, enough of them, and 
bitter too, but the rebellious district was all 
the while, and never for a moment ceased to 
be, a part of the American Union, of our undi- 
vided and indivisible country. Never for a 
moment did we absolve the people of those 
States from their allegiance and duty to this 
Government, nor was the claim of any part, or 
any one of them, to be released from allegiance, 
or from any duty due from them as citizens, 
ever entertained. Never did we abrogate or 
relinquish our right to collect taxes, to compel 
military service, to hang for treason, any 
individual in these States. When the rebel- 
lion was strongest and most hopeful of final 
success, as at all other times, the whole rebel- 
lious district was enfolded in the strong arms 
of the national Government, and our Army 
and Navy beleagured it on every side, and 
proclaimed to the inhabitants thereof, and to 
the world, from the mouths of ten thousand 
cannon, '"This is the land of the Republic, 
and the people thereof are its citizens, and 
owe it allegiance and service." 

Now, when such of these citizens as have 
maintained their loyalty and allegiance to the 
Republic through all, and through unparalleled 
trials and persecutions, come and ask payment, 



as other citizens, for material and valuable aid 
rendered the Government in its efforl to sub- 
due insurrection, are we to meet tliem at the 
doors of this Chamber with the declaration, 
"Away with your claims; you are enemies, 
public enemies of the Government ; we will 
nol pay you ; we need all the money to pay the 
Vallandighams of Ohio and the Sons of Lib- 
erty of Indiana?'' If this be public justice, 
then I am at a Kiss to imagine what public 
injustice would be. h' this be sound public 
policy, then I do not know what unsound policy 
would be. 

If to tell the widows and the orphans of the 
men of the South who were hung to the limbs 
of trees for loyalty to our flag, or fell in our 
armies under it, and whose bones have been 
gathered by a grateful people into our beauti- 
ful national cemeteries, that they cannot be 
paid for food and forage furnished our soldiers, 
because they and their husbands and lathers 
were and are public enemies, be not the very 
climax of ingratitude, injustice, and inhuman- 
ity, then I have misunderstood the theory of 
this Government and of the late war, aud my 
head and heart are alike wrong. 

FEAR OF FRAUD. 

But it is alleged that the Government will 
lie defrauded. Sir, there is danger of fraud 
everywhere, in Congress, courts, and claimants. 
Men sell cadetships. Shall you abolish Con- 
gress and West Point? This country has 
furnished an Arnold who would have sold 
mtry. Shall you abolish the Army V 
Judges have been corrupt. Shall you abolish 
the courts? Judas betrayed Christ. Was our 
Saviour and his religion, therefore, to be with- 
out apostles? Of course there will be some 
cheating in these claims, as t here will be in 
mng until the millennium shall have 
dawned; and when I look over the world 
from this capital and see how much is to be 
done, what mighty changes are to be wrought 
in the hearts of men, 1 am painfully led to 
think that the time is far distant when all men 
will pay in the coin of truth all their obliga- 
tions to themselves, to society, and to God. 
Ami 1 hope that payment to these noble south- 
ern loyalists may not. lie deferred until that 
remote day — far more remote, i fear, than the 
day of specie payments. This taint of fraud ; 
this want of fidelity in every word and act to 
judgment, and conscience; this depravity of 
the human heart, which, if not total, is bad 
enough, is not peculiar to the people of the 
South. We are continually being deceived 
and defrauded by bad men in all sections of 
the country. Shall you abolish the mail ser- 
vice because you occasionally get- a thieving 
postmaster? Shall you cease to levy and col- 
lect taxes because some citizens make false 
returns and some of your officers may be cor- 
rupt? Shall we cease to appropriate money 
for the public expenses because some of it will 
be misapplied? Shall wecease to pay bounties 
to our soldiers and sailors because some of 



them go to cowards and deserters? Shall we 
cease to elect Presidents because we have had 
an Andrew Johnson? 

Tie; Saviour, in choosing twelve, got one 

traitor; we ought not to expect to do better. 
Do not let us refuse to pay our honest debts on 
the plea that we are afraid that, we will pay 
some that we are not bound to pay. That 
would be like a man refui ing to pay his notes 
because he was afraid some one might presenl 
a forgery. Guard the measure as well as we 
can against fraud, so that you do not so restrict 
it. as to make it a mockery, a cup of Tantalus, 
to be seen and not tasted, but, avow and enact, 
our duty and our willingness to pay loyal per- 
sons for property taken for the use of our 
armies. 

Why, Mr. President, we are paying pensions 
and bounties to some of these claimants. Only 

k we passed a bill granting a | 
to an Alabamian. Do we give bounties and 
pensions to public enemies? Do we make 
postmasters, revenue officers, marshals. Uni- 
ted Siates attorneys, and judges of enemies? 

But, it will be said these people are only 
enemies in law, not in fact; their treason is 
only constructive, not real. Mr. President, 
the class of persons for whom we claim pay- 
ment are not, enemies at all, in any sense, and 
never have been. They are, and always have 
been, our best friends. They have not been 
guilty of treason, either actual or constructive. 

Mr. President, we cannot afford to say that 
these eight or nine million people inhabiting 
the lately rebellious States are the enemies, 
publicly or privately, of the ( rovernment. We 
cannot afford to say to the world by our refusal 
to pay these claims of loyal men at the South 
that the rebellious States were ever out of the 
Union ; that the confederacy was an estab- 
lished government; that, the allegiance of these 
citizensto the national Government bad ceased; 
that they had all become by successful war 
aliens and public enemies ; that we conquered 
them all by force of arms; that we hold them 
all in the Union and in subjection to our laws 
by military force. This admission would sound 
badly (in the discussion of the Alabama claims) 
when repeated by the British minister, would 
hurt our standing among the nations of the 
world, would impair the national credit, and 
discourage loyalty in the future. 

No, Mr. President, this veil of constructive 
treason under which it is sought to hide our 
otherwise admitted obligation to pay the just 
claims of truly loyal men at the South is too 
thin to hide the palpable injustice of denying 
payment to a widow of one of our own soldiers, 
to whom you are now paying a pension, for 
food furnished her husband and his comrades 
while fighting under our fla 

FRUITS or RECONSTRUCTION. 

But, Mr. President. 1 want to say a word 
about the fruits of this system of reconstruc- 
tion which has been so much abused by the 
Democratic party. The first grand result to 



which I desire to call attention, and which is 
worth all the sacrifices of the war, is the con- 
stitutions of those southern States which guar- 
anty liberty, equal rights, and universal edu- 
cation and universal suffrage. These constitu- 
tions are fully up to the spirit of the age, and 
embody the best ideas of the civilization of the 
last half of the nineteenth century. They 
have been the work of the plan of reconstruc 
tion established by the Republican party, and 
of universal suffrage, and all that is required 
to give prosperity, security of life and prop- 
erty, and happiness at the South is a faithful 
and honest administration under them by hon- 
est and competent men, and the support of a 
healthful, bold, public sentiment to sustain the 
officers of the law in enforcing it and in arrest- 
ing and punishing criminals. But for the con- 
dition of universal suffrage imposed by Con- 
gress, constitutions so just to all, so wisely 
regardful of the interests of education and 
internal development, so in harmony with the 
advancing spirit of theage, would not and could 
not have been adopted for at, least a generation 
to come. Thus fir has the hand of just progress 
been pushed forward on the dial of time by a 
patriotic Congress in adopting a sound prin- 
ciple ; and I venture the prediction that no 
backward wave of Democratic reaction will 
ever be found strong enough to seriously 
disturb these constitutions thus firmly founded 
in wisdom and justice. 

These new governments have sometimes 
been brought into disrepute by the fact that I 
have before stated, that corrupt and incompe- 
tent men have got into position under them, 
who have not only brought discredit upon the 
congressional plan of reconstruction, but upon 
the very principles which underlie it. For 
those men I have no apology, no defense to 
make. Some of them, I admit, have been so 
corrupt that, like the pariahs of India, their 
shadows would pollute the very water upon 
which they might fall, and I wish as heartily 
as any man that we were rid of them. The 
party of reconstruction and the great princi- 
ples upon which reconstruction was founded 
would be the stronger and the country bene- 
fitted by their riddance. 

Much of the responsibilities for the defeat 
of the Republican party in some of the south- 
ern States is due to these incompetent or 
selfish and corrupt men. I have read some- 
where of a traveler in the Alps who saw on 
the mountain side a poor sheep dragging about 
its dead comrade, to which it had been tied by 
a straw-rope by the shepherd to prevent stray- 
ing too far. The poor animal had picked 
every blade of grass and every leaf and twig 
within reach of its strength to drag the carcass 
to which it, was tied, and was just ready to fall 
and die when the compassionate traveler cut 
the straw band and set it free to use and enjoy 
its natural strength. So these selfish, corrupt, 
and immoral men have been as dead carcasses 
chained to Republicanism ; and I ask all honest 
men of all parties to join me in cutting them 



loose and in putting the administration of 
republican government in the hands of honest 
and competent men. But the Democrats of 
the southern States have themselves mainly 
to thank for these base officers, for it was their 
bitter and intolerant spirit which prevented 
many good men from taking office under the 
reconstructed governments. The Democrats 
sought by proscription, intimidation, and abuse 
to keep all good men from accepting office, 
and now abuse us because we have given them 
bad ones. 

But, sir, there has not been a scheme of cor- 
ruption consummated or projected, in connec- 
tion with these southern States and municipal 
governments, in which Democrats have not 
been full partners and from which they have not 
had their full share of plunder. I have never 
yet voted a Democratic ticket, but will agree 
to do so when ail Democrats get to be honest. 
And when they shall purify the government of 
the city and State of New York, where they have 
ample power, I will agree they may cast stones 
at our southern State governments. What this 
Democratic government of New York city is, 
let the following extracts from Democratic 
papers show. Pomeroy's Democrat of Sep- 
tember 28, 1870, says, editorially: 

"Democrats here in this Democratic city stand 
back like cowards, waiting in line with thieves, 
repeaters, crib-keepers, burglars, murderers, and 
prison-birds, to see who is a fit man to represent, 
not the people, but Bill Tweed, Peter B. Sweeney, 
Slippery Dick Connolly, and a few other owners of 
mahogany barns, rose-wood hog pens, and veneered 
palaces filled with furniture charged to and paid for 
by the city. 

" Under the management of our present city offi- 
cials the credit of the city is not worth so much as 
the promise of a blackleg or a drunken prostitute. 
For they wi'U keep their word, while the head sa- 
chems of Tammany, claiming to own the city of New 
York, live by lying, thrive by trickery, fatten in cor- 
ruption, cheat their supporters, victimize the pub- 
lic, rob the tax-payers, steal from every fund they 
handle, and pay audited claims of honest business 
men only on shares." 

The New York Evening Free Press, of Feb- 
ruary 20, 1870, with Senator Thurman's name 
at the mast-head for President in 1872, says, 
in a leading editorial : 

"Were an honest vote cast here, honestly can- 
vassed, these men would not retain their usurped 
power twenty-four hours, and we should be saved 
not only from the deep disgrace of being ruled by 
them, but from being annually robbed of millions 
of dollars. Will any respectable citizen disinter- 
estedly say that it is contrary to the spirit, intent, 
and province of a republican Government to adopt 
the only means left forgetting a fair acknowledg- 
ment of the will of the voters of this city? We have 
no hope in State authorities for protection. They 
are the instruments of the ring, and owe their place? 
and power to the very frauds they should be the first 
to deprecate and overthrow. The police are a large 
felloe in the ring's great balance wheel, and we can 
look to them for anything but aid in this extremity." 

Let the Democracy get out of their glass 
houses before they begin stone-throwing. 

MILITARY INTERFERENCE. 

But, Mr. President, the charge has been 
heralded forth in every Democratic newspaper 
of the country, and has been rung in our ears 
iu this Chamber day after day by the Demo- 



9 



cratic Senators, that these government 
forced on (he people of the southern States by 
of the bayonet ; thai i bey are ustained 
by the Army, and that elections are 
by military interference. J brand all these 
charges as utterly untrue, and challen 
proof. 1 make the assertion broadly, from a 
thorough knowledge of the facts within my 
own State, that neither the Army, nor any 
member of it, has ever been used or has ever 
acted tn intimidate, or to control voters, or to 
influence their votes in favor of the Repub- 
lican party. The troops have been then' sim 
ply as the conservators of the peace, and have 
only when called upon by the proper 
civil officers, to aid them in tin; execution of 
judicial process or the precepts of courts. 
In no other manner have they ever been used 
or have they ever a '. during President 
Grant's administration, ... 7 1 defy proof to 
the contrary. 

This cry about military interference in elec- 
tions in the South, and about, constitutions 
being forced on the people by ba 

partisan cry for political effect, and has no 
foundation in facts. The Senate committee 
-ligation has In en continued through 
the nexl s i ssion. 1 rpon that commits i 
have been placed by the Republican President 
of the Senate two of Democratic 

irs, [Mr. Blair and Mr. Bayard,] who 
have most loudly repeated this charge that the 
Army lias been used to control the elections 
at the South. They are in communication 
with their Democratic friends in the South, as 
is shown by the communication from Governor 
Lindsay, of Alabama, which the Senator from 
Delaware [Mr. Bayard] caused to be read in 
atea few days ago. Their Democratic 
friends in the other House will also be glad to 
furnish any information they may have on this 
point. The committee has power to summon 
witnesses. Now, 1 challenge them to furnish 
to the Senate and the country the proof of the 
truth of this charge of the use of the bayonet 
to control elections which these Democratic 
Senators have SO often and so boldly made oil 
this floor. Sir, the proof cannol be made in a 
single instance under General Grant's adminis- 
tration. 

Mr. BLAIR. Mr. President— 

The VICE PRESIDENT. Does the Sen- 
ator from Alabama yield to the Senator from 
Missouri'.' 

Mr. WARNER. In one moment. If these 
facts are as charged ; if. as the Senator from 
Missouri, who is now appealing to me, says. 
oops ha ' drive voters from 

the polls, the fact can be established, and 1 
hope it may be. Now I will yield to the 
Senator. 

Mr. BLAIR. l[ thi 3 c challenges 

any particular instance of in ■ of the 

military, I should like to ask him if the mili- 
tary did not Si ate-hou 
State to keep out the regularly elected Gov- 
ernor at the last election in the interest of one 



who was dele, iied by the people, and if the 
military did not succeed in doing it for some 
time '.' 

Mr. WARNER. I am coming to that very 

point directly, and 1 hope the Senator will 
remain in the Chamber. I shall answer him 
very fully' on that point. For n. ] 

answer "no," mosi emphatically. The 
ator from Missouri, in debating this ques- 
tion of military inti rference i nth, on 
the 15th of 1 Lid — I quote from the 
( rlobe of February 1 i : 

" li is only necessary now to withdraw th i Array 
from the South, were it is employed in driving 
voters from tl < ying the el 

ugaiust a majority of t he legn I vi 
and the people will resume their rightful authi rity." 

"Mr. President. I was pi ■ II aware that 

i.cti le, a it hough it n uence I at I ic S iuih, 

would not_end there. The party in power com- 

■ 
gers in the southern States, in the i 

* :: * " New an leel ion is 

net valid unless it is superintende 1 by the bayonets 
ut' the regular Array. Our Army moves v, 
there is an election. They no lo irupori 

of the Go vi 
r upon the politica I opp i lenl 3 of the 
Administration, and charge upon the. ballot-boxes' 
and the polls." 

And. again, on the 24th of February, the 
Senator from Missouri said — I quote from the 

G! »be of February 28 : 

" The head of the Army was made President by the 
.He never would have be in in el 
dent it'i hi I of I he Army had n 

from the hands of th ' lent, where il was 

lodged by the I in<l id in the Gen- 

eral's hands, in violation of the Constitution, and 
1 by him through hissubordinat.es through- 

! Soul li. He eleel ed him self by tl 

as much as Louis Napoleon Bonaparte ace mplished 
i I and he will u 

iy in New 5Tork as he has done in Missisi 
sipiu.'' 

Now, Mr. President, these are grave, bold 
charges, which, if true, would be a. sufficient 
ground for the impeachment and conviction 
of President Grant. The Senator charges him 
with the gravest crime possible, that of mili- 
tary usurpation. I challenge the Senator to 
the proof. He has the opportunity. He is 
upon a committee where In; can summon any 
witnesses he chooses. Let him bring the proof 
before the country. I cannol, prove a negative. 
He can prove the affirmative, if his statement 
be true ; and I hold him responsible 
country for the proof of his charge. 1 venture 
the prediction that he cannot bring reliable 
witnesses to swear to a single cue of in 

th a single voter iu the South during 
General Grant's administration. 

Sir, this talk about the fear of troops at the 
i is idle and absurd. Tee American 
people are not, afraid of I he men 
troops. The fact that a few troops w< re in 
New York somewhere daring the election, had 
as little influence in keeping r ^ from 

voting as they chose, as did ' [ I at the 

is in Alaska and 
Paris. 

But, sir, a great deal lias been said about 



10 



the presence of troops in New York and about 
the election law which we passed at the last 
session, and that there was no need tor the 
one, and no authority for the other. 1 hold 
in my hand a paper published in New York, 
the Evening Free Press; and as it flies, as I 
have said before, the name of my friend, the 
able and distinguished Senator from Ohio, 
[Mr. Thurman,] for President, I presume it 
is good Democratic authority. I find in this 
paper this editorial in regard to elections in 
New York, under date of February 20, 1871 : 

"It maybe, as some over-zealous sticklers for the- 
oretical freedom say, anti-democratic to advocate 
the armed supervision of elections in this city, but 
we doubt it. We cannot conceive of anything in 
practice more anti-democratic than the corruption 
of the ballot-box. If tbe purity of elections cannot 
be preserved by easy methods, let it be maintained 
and secured by the most stringent measures. If 
bayonets will not suffice to prevent the will of the 
people from being defeated by thieves, ruffians, per- 
jurers, and place-seekers, we say plant batteries at 
the polls and use them. No honest citizen cares a 
rush about meeting soldiers at his voting-place if 
they arc discovered to be neeessary to the preven- 
tion of his vote being either thrown aside or fraud- 
ulently counted in favor of the candidate against 
whom ho cast it. Every good citizen, whatever may 
be his party, will rejoice at the adoption of any 
method by which the frauds which have become a 
system in our elections here can be stopped. 

"For several years these frauds have become so 
gigantic, so overpowering, and so thoroughly well 
understood and comprehended, thatdeccnt men have 
refrained from voting, knowing that they would ex- 
pend the time and trouble needful in so doing for 
nothing and to no purpose. What bribery, repeat- 
ing, ruffianly violence, false registry, and whisky 
were unable to wholly accomplish, wholesale swind- 
ling in canvassing has completed, and thus both the 
city and the State have been given over into the 
possession of the four unprincipled rascals who tire 
now known the world over as the New York 'ring.' 
These men have organized their corrupting machin- 
ery so skillfully that nothing short of Federal inter- 
ference with it, and that by force of arms, can defeat 
its infamous puiposin * * * * *' * 

"We must have either a Federal election law, or 
before a great while we shall be compelled to right 
our wrongs, or at least put an end to them, by re- 
course to a law which would be still more 'oppress- 
ive,' 'infamous,' and 'unconstitutional,' namely, 
the law administered by Judge Lynch. The question 
embraced in the Federal election law which dis- 
turbs the ring was debated when the adoption of 
the Constitution was under consideration." 

This is good Democratic authority in favor 
of the necessity of troops in New York at elec- 
tion time and on,the question of the constitu- 
tional authority of Congress to pass election 
laws. I commend to the attention of our Dem- 
ocratic friends the following extract from No. 
59 of the Federalist, written by Alexander 
Hamilton : 

"The natural order of the subject leads us to 
consider in this place that provision of the Consti- 
tution which authorizes the national Legislature to 
regulate, in the last resort, the election of its own 
members. It is in these words: 'The times, places. 
and manner of holding elections in each State shall 
be prescribed by the Legislature thereof; but the 
Congress may at any lime by law make or alter such 
regulations, except as to the places of choosing Sen- 
ator-.' This provision has not only been declaimed 
against by those who condemn the Constitution in 
the gross, but it has been censured by those who 
have objected with less latitude and gre iter moder- 
ation." * * * * "I am greatly mistaken, 
notwithstanding, if there be any other article in the 
whole plan more completely defensible than this. 



Its propriety rests upon the evidence of this plain 
proposition: that every Government, ought to con- 
tain in itself the means of its own preservation. 
Every just, reason will tit first sight approve an ad- 
herence to this rule in the work of the Convention, 
and will disapprove every deviation from it which 
may not appear to have been dictated by the neces- 
sity of incorporating into the work some particular 
ingredient with which a. rigid conformity to the rule 
was incompatible." * * * * "It will 
not be alleged that an election law could have been 
framed and inserted in the Constitution which would 
have been applicable to every probable change in 
the situation of the country; and it will, therefore, 
not be denied that a discretionary power over elec- 
tions ought to exist somewhere. 

"It will, I presume, be as readily conceded that 
there were only three ways in which this powercould 
have been reasonably organized; that it must either 
have been lodged wholly in the national Legislature, 
or wholly in the State Legislatures, or primarily in 
the latter and ultimately in the former. The last 
mode has, with reason, been preferred by the Con- 
vention. They have submitted the regulations of 
elections for the Federal Government, in the first 
instance, to the local administrations, which, in 
ordinary cases and when no improper views prevail, 
maybe both more convenient and more satisfactory; 
but they have reserved to the national authority a 
right to interfere whenever extraordinary circum- 
stances might render that interposition necessary to 
its safety. Nothing can be more evident than that 
an exclusive power of regulating elections for the 
national Government in tin; hands of the State 
Legislature would leave the existence of the Union 
entirely at their mercy." * * * * "If we 
are in a humor to presume the abuses of power, it 
is as fair to presume them on the part of the State 
government as on the part of the General Govern- 
ment. And, as it is more consonant to the rules of 
a just theory, to intrust the Union with the care of 
its own existence than to transfer that care to any 
other hands, if abuses of power are to be hazarded 
on the one side or on the other, it is more rational to 
hazard them where the power would naturally be 
placed than where it would unnaturally be placed." 

Now, Mr. President, Congress has only gone 
so far as to provide by law certain remedies 
for frauds at the polls, which the majority of 
Congress thought perfectly proper and consti- 
tutional, and yet a great outcry is raised about 
it; yet this Democratic paper says, if neither 
the civil law nor bayonets and batteries will 
answer to protect the honest voters against the 
frauds and corruptions in that city, then resort 
must be had to lynch law to protect the free- 
dom of the ballot. I think our Democratic 
friends must have forgotten the fact that Mr. 
Buchanan not only called out but used troops 
at an election here in the city of Washington. 

Mr. BOREMAN. Will the Senator give us 
the date of that paper from which he has 
quoted ? 

Mr. WARNER. New York, February 20, 
1871. 

FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT. 

Mr. President, I was surprised at the argu- 
ment of my friend, the distinguished Senator 
from Missouri, in regard to the fifteenth amend- 
ment. He declared that the fifteenth amend- 
ment had been proposed by a usurping frag- 
ment of a Congress ; that it had been carried 
in the northern States against the will of the 
people and by fraud, and had been forced 
upon the southern States, and yet, that not- 
withstanding all these alleged facts, it is bind- 
ing and valid to all intents and purposes. I do 



11 



not see the connection between the premises 
and tin- conclusion. 

The Senator, on the 15th of February last, 
said : 

" What is this whole system of reconstruction, as 
ii is called, this exclusion of States from their in her- 
ein and guarantied rights? Taxation without rep- 
ition, their fundamental laws set aside, the 
popular will suppressed, the right <>f suffrage taken 
from the States by a usurping fragment of Congress, 
the Federal Constitution itself changed in its char- 
acl er by the same usurping fragment and in defiance 
of the known and expressed will of the people. The 
Government is literally, praotically subverted. " 

And yet he admits the validity of the fif- 
teenth amendment, proposed by this usurping 
fragment of a Congress and adopted through 
fraud and force. I quote from the Globe of 
February 18 what the Senator said on this point 
on the 15th of February: 

"Mr. Morton. The Senator will allow me to say 
that his answeris not explicit. His argument is that 
certain States improperly ratified it; but the ques- 
tion was whether he regards the adoptii f the 

amendment as complete and the amendment as 
being now a part of the law of the land? 

"Mr. Blair. 1 shall endeavor to lie sufficiently 
explicit. I do regard it as complete. I do regard it 
as a part of the law of the laud." 

If I believed that the Congress that proposed 
the fifteenth amendment was but a " usurping 
fragment" of a Congress, I certainly could not, 
hold that the fifteenth amendment is legal and 
binding upon the people of the United States. 
I am glad, to save agitation, and that so wise 
.a measure may rest in peace and safety, that 
the Senator lias come to the conclusion to 
maintain the validity of this amendment ; and 
1 hope he will adhere to it. 

But. sir. what would be the result of the Sen- 
ator's position that Congress was a '•usurping 
fragment*' of a legal body from 1801 to 1870? 
Why, sir. then at the very time that the Sen- 
ator himself held a seat, in the other House at 
tin- beginning of the war, it was a fragment of 
;i Congress and lie was part of it. The south- 
ern Senators and Representatives had con- 
temptuously left their seats in Congress, not 
even deigning to resign, and had gone home 
to make war : but the Senator himself remained 
in the other branch of Congress, wisely .and 
patriotically, as I remember, doing his duty 
then; as a Representative of his State, as a 
part of that usurping fragment of a Congress, 
and took an active part in enacting the laws 
under which we made war, and under which 
hundreds of thousands of brave men were sent 
to their graves and thousands of millions of 
treasure drawn from the people of this country 
and expended in the prosecution of that war. 

Sir, if the Congress of which lie was a part 
was a usurping fragment of a Congress, it was 
without authority to prosecute war, and he and 
1 were guilty of murder in killing men of the 
South engaged in the rebellion, under the pre- 
tendea authority of the action of that Congress. 
1 see no eseape from the conclusion, if his doc- 
trine be correct, that his commissions which 
the Senator held in the Union Army were 
''null and void,'' that his troops were but a 



mob, and that lie was but a marauder and 
plunderer when at Cheraw, South Carolina, 
he "dispensed hospitality in a manner to put 
to shame the most, hospitable South Caro- 
linian." 

But, Mr. President, what is a further conse- 
quence? If by the desertion of the rebel Sen- 
ators and Representatives from these Halls 
Congress ceased to be a legal law-making body 
of this country under the Constitution, and 
became a usurping, fragmentary body, then 
the rebels had it in their power, simply by leav- 
ing their seats, to destroy the legislative power 
of the country and to break- down the Govern- 
ment. According to that, theory, Congress was 
destroyed when 1 (avis, Toombs, and their asso- 
ciates in rebellion left, their places in Congress 

to engage in rebellion: the legislative power 
of the country was at, an end : Congress was 
destroyed; there was no power even to make 
laws to put, down the rebellion, to raise sol- 
diers, or to levy taxes to pay them. That prin- 
ciple, if carried out, would put. it in the power 
of a minority at, any time, by leaving their seats 
in Congress, to break up tin; Government. 

But. .Mr. President, tin; Senator from Mis- 
souri denies till power in Congress to punish 
for rebellion, even to the extent, of imposing 
disabilities from holding office, and asserts 
that there can be no legal punishment for re- 
bellion except through the conviction of a 
court. The Senator said : 

"This legislative trial, conviction, and punish- 
ment, is known to every lawyer to bea lull of attain- 
der prohibited by the Constitution of the United 

States." 

If that be true, then Davis might have come 
back to his seat in the Senate at any time, be- 
cause expulsion for treason would have been 
a punishment which, under the Senator's 
theory, Congress could not inflict. Not only 
Davis, but all the rest, of those who left, here 
to engage in the rebellion, could at any time 
have returned and claimed their seats, and 
there would have been no power in Congress 
to prevent. Furthermore, they might, even 
now return and claim their pay : and the offi- 
cers of the Army who deserted tin; flag to join 
the rebel armies might return and claim their 
pay, and perhaps even their [daces in the 
Army, for not one of them litis been judicially 
convicted of treason against, the Government. 
These are the legitimate consequences of the 
denial to Congress of tiny power to impose 
any punishment or disability for rebellion; 
and the Senator considers even the imposition 
of test-oaths as a punishment for rebellion. 

But, Mr. President, the Senator seems to 
have held a very different opinion on the 11th 
of July, 1805, when he issued to the officers 
and soldiers of the seventeenth corps his: 
famous order, from which 1 extract as follows: 

"The Romans made their conquering soldiers 
freeholders in the lands they had conquered; and 

a- upon your return to your home-; you will find 

oio toi your occupation and employments filled by 

adepts from civil lite, and as the Government has 



12 



yast tracts of vacant lands which will be increased 
by the war, the interests of the country and your 
own will concur in the apportionmentof these lands 
to your use and occupancy, establishing a citizen 
soldiery to maintain internal peace and set foreign 
foes at defiance." 

Speaking of the defeat of Napoleon's schemes 
in Mexico, he further said in the same order : 

" If that object can be obtained by pacific means, 
then soldiery is at an end and your sole busines 
hereafter will be to develop, enrich, and improve 
our great country. To that end our soldiersshould 
be provided with homesteads, and in no part of the 
country would they fare better or would they be 
more useful than in the South, which they have 
redeemed." 

Now here is a plain proposition for the con- 
fiscation of the lands of rebels, and a direct 
recommendation to his officers and soldiers to 
carpet- bag down South to the land which they 
have redeemed. But now, while the Senator 
utters no word against the Ku Klux mobs in 
the South, which hang men for their political 
opinions, he can find no language strong 
enough to denounce Congress for keeping a 
few men out of office for rebellion. What 
great light has the Senator seen since July, 
1865, that has so changed his mind and his 
heart ? 

CARPET-BAGGEKS. 

But I desire to notice another charge which 
we hear a great deal about. The favorite name 
applied to our southern governments by our 
Democratic friends is that of "carpet-bag gov- 
ernments," and the northern men, mostly sol- 
diers who went to the South after the war, are 
called "carpet-baggers." I know that before 
the war the South was a pretty hot place for a 
northern man with northern ideas, but sup- 
posed that one of the results of the war was the 
vindication of the right of any citizen of this 
country to go into any part of the country and 
become a citizen and have equal political rights 
with other citizens there, including freedom of 
speech and political action. 

I did not anticipate that I should find the 
Senator from Missouri applying to us what is 
understood to be an odious appellation, that 
of "carpet-bagger." I am the more surprised 
because I think he has been something of a 
carpet-bagger himself. If my memory serves 
me right, he went to Louisiana about the same 
time and for the same purpose that I went to 
Alabama, to raise cotton, and I think had 
about the same luck ; and I am astonished that 
he should be so ready to believe all the rumors 
that are circulated about carpet-baggers. 

I know very well that when the Senator 
talks in any disparaging way about carpet- 
baggers he does not intend to apply it to me 
personally, for I know how kindly his feelings 
toward me are ; but I am surprised that he 
should seek the disparagement of these men, 
who were mostly soldiers, and some of whom 
followed his lead in the war against the rebel- 
lion, on mere rumor, for he has been the 
victim of rumor himself, and I should have 
thought that having felt the injustice thereby 



done him he would not be so ready to heed 
it as to others. 

I remember a story which was current 
through the South, and was published gener- 
ally in the papers, about the Senator from 
Missouri, and which was doubtless as ground- 
less as most of the stories that he hears about 
his comrades. The story is, that at a political 
meeting in the neighborhood where the Sen- 
ator had his plantation, his Democratic friends 
got a colored man to preside, as is their habit, 
in hopes to get the colored vote for Seymour 
and Blair. After the white men had got through 
with their speeches, which were largely made 
up of abuse of carpet-baggers, who, it wa8 
alleged, had gone down there to spy out and 
plunder the land, the colored president of the 
meeting was called upon for a speech. He 
said, in response, that he indorsed all that had 
been said about these carpet-baggers; that 
he himself had been in the employ of a carpet- 
bagger, and had worked for him all summer, 
and the carpet-bagger had gone off without 
paying him ; and, said he, "I think you must all 
know him; I have heard his name called many 
times to-day; they call him Frank Blair." 
[Laughter.] 

"Carpet-baggers" are northern men living 
at the South, and are like men everywhere; 
there are some good and some bad among 
them ; but, let me tell the Senator, there are 
as many good men among them as you will 
find among any equal number of men else- 
where. We have in my State some of the 
Senator's own officers and soldiers, who are 
all the supporters of reconstruction, and who 
are in patriotism and moral worth, if not in 
position and ability, the peers of the Senator. 
His gallantand skillful adjutant general, whom 
he will well remember, is one of them, and I 
do not think he, when he remembers his services 
to his country, his fidelity in her hour of trial, 
his purity of private character, would expect 
his old commander, by any indirection even, 
to cast any aspersion upon him because he had 
seen fit to go to Alabama after the war and 
honestly cast his lot among that people and 
voted as his judgment and conscience bade 
him. The Senator's commissary is another of 
these "carpet-baggers." Now let me say to the 
Senator that these "carpet-baggers," mostly 
soldiers, who are the equals in bravery and 
fidelity to their country if not in ability to the 
Senator himself, are nearly all, I may say, 
almost without exception, found upon my side 
of reconstruction and not upon his. It is a 
curious fact, if this policy of reconstruction be 
such an abomination, such an outrage upon the 
people, and so contrary to the spirit in which 
we conducted the war. that nearly all the sol- 
diers of the country should be found sustain- 
ing it. 

I am surprised that the Senator from Mis- 
souri should revive his null and void doctrines 
about reconstruction. In the last presidential 
election he called the yeas and nays of the 
American people on that question, and they 



13 



voted by a majority of three hundred thousand 
that reconstruction was not "null and void," 
but should stand. 

THE ALABAMA ELECTION. 

Now, Mr. President, I will speak of the 
Alabama election, and the gubernatorial con- 
test there, which the Senator inquires of me 
about. The Senator from Delaware [Mr. Bay- 
ami J said the other day in debate, and I then 
sought the opportunity to correct him, but he 
declined to yield to me — I quote from the 
Globe of February 18 — 

"There was an election held in Alabama, as in 
other Slates. last fall. A Legislature, a Governor, a 
State treasurer, ami other officers were elected. The 
Governor, not content with the result of that elec- 
tion as evidenced by the counting of the von-, first 
took the usual remedy indicated by congressional ex- 
ample and attempted by force to keep possession of 
the archives of the Slate and the papers of bis office. 
Failing in that he resorted to the legal tribunals of 
his State." 

Mr. President, to use the mildest term, the 
statement of the Senator from Delaware is en- 
tirely incorrect. The facts tire these, and I 
avail myself of a very clear statement made in 
a speech by one of my colleagues [Mr. Buck] 
in the House : 

" Von have seen it stated by the press that Gov- 
ernor Smith sought to retain possession of the office 
for which, as a candidate, he hail been defeated by 
the use ol Federal troops, negroes, militia. t fcc. All 
such reports are wit hout foundation, and were know- 
ingly and falsely circulated to mislead the public 
mind for political eti'eet anil to direct at tent ion from 
the real wrongs ami outrages of the Ku Klux Dem- 
ocracy. 

"I have already shown that Governor Smith re- 
ceived more votes than .Mr. Lindsey. I will now 
show you how he attempted to obtain a fair count 
il i- by which he was unquestionably reelect 
e i. He employed three of the ablest lawyers in the 
State, namely, ex Governor Parsons, lion. Alexan- 
der White, ami Samuel F. Rice, late chief jusliee 
of the supreme court of the State, to examine the 
question and advise the course proper to be taken. 
T!i nstitution ol the State declares that — 

" ' (Jo n tested elect ions for executive officers shall be 
determined by both Eouses of the General Assembly 
in such manner as shall be prescribed by law.' 

fin- has been the language of the constitution 
> I ', yet by sonic oversight the Legislature has 
never ' prescribed the manner ' in which it should be 
'lone. '1'h ere was but one of two alternatives for the 
Governor in this -tale of the case. He must give up 
: lie office to which he had been legally reelected and 

i lie cause of education ami internal improvements, 
both of which are peculiarly Republican principles 

in our State, or he must resort to the courts of the 
land for relief. 

"After a very careful examination of the legal 
questions involved it was determined to file a bill 
in the chancery court for .Montgomery county, fully 
Stating all the foregoing facts and many others which 
cannol be now mentioned, showing that he was not 

only entitled to tl Bice by a majority of more than 

Onethousand votes, it the votes actually given were 
counted, but thai by means of force, fraud, and vio- 
lence the Republican party had been deprived of 
many thousand votes which their candidates other- 
wise would have received. 

"ill was tiled ace rdin-ly. It contained a, 

prayer for an injunction restraining the presiding 

ij the Senate, i lion. R. N. Barr.) whose duty 

' open and publish ' tip- \ for I rOVemor 

during the first week of the session, in the prescuce 
of a majority of the members of the General A ssem- 
bly, from performing that duty until the General 
Assembly, then in session, could ' prescribe the man- 
ner' tor making the conte I a provided in the con- 
stitution; and in case the General Assembly should 



refuse to ' prescribe the manner,' then that the court 
of chancery should take jurisdiction of the case. In 
the absence of the chancellor the bill was presented 
to lion. Benjamin F. Saffold, one of tin; judge- of 
the supreme court of the State, who granted the 
injunction, which was duly issued and served on 
the presiding officer of the senate. 

"On the day required by law that officer, in the 
presence of the two houses of the General Assembly, 
in joint con vent ion in the hall of the house of repre- 
sentative,-, proceeded to open and publish the vote 
for other executive State officers; but as he had been 
enjoined from opening and publishing the vote for 
Governor, (and also for the office of treasurer, on a 
lull tiled by that officer,) be read to the convention a 
copy of the injunction in each case which bad been 
served on him : and in obedience to them announced 
to the convention that Ik; should not open and pub- 
lish the vote for each of those offices : and he did not. 
Alter this was done t he Senate retired i in mediately to 
th(! senate clumber in a body, and then adjourned 
until the following Monday morning ' t his being Sat- 
urday) at the usual hour; and the journal of the sen- 
ate will show these facts. Thcspeaker of the Bouse 
then assumed to be the presiding otlicer of a joint 
convention of the two nouses, not a senator being 
present. In a few minutes the Lieutenant Governor- 
elect, having taken the oath of office before a circuit 
judge who was present forlbe purpose, but after the 
Semite had adjourned and not in I lie presence of t hat 
body, collect ively or individually, except one or two. 
Came into the hall of the house and assumed to bo 
the presiding otlicer of the senate, and therefore tho 
presiding officer of that convention, upon which a 
large majority of the Republican members of the 
hon-e retired. A secretary was appointed, and the 
returns of the election for Governor and treasurer 
were sent for. th»y having been returned uncounted 
to the secretary of State for safe-keeping by Hon. 
Mr. Ban*. These returns were produced, and the 
aforesaid Lieutenant Governor-elect, claiming to 
be the presiding officer of the senate, proceeded to 
open and publish the vote for these two officers in 
the presence of the house of representatives only — 
two senators only having returned to tin; hall after 
the adjournment of the senate — ami then and there 
declared Mr. Liudsey duly elected by a majority of 
fourteen hundred and twenty-nine votes. 

"This high-handed proceeding, of which I was an 
eye-witness, was in violation of the constitution and 
laws of Alabama in several particulars: 

"1. It was a violation of the law and fact for the 
speaker to assume to preside over a joint convention 
of the two houses when only one house was present. 

"2. The constitution requires the vote for Governor 
to beopened and published by the presiding officer of 
the senate, in the presence of a majority of the mem- 
bers of the General Assembly. The senate was not 
present. 

"3. The law of the State requires the Governor to 
take the oath of office in the presence of both houses. 
The oath was administered in the presence of the 
house alone. 

" t. 'I he Lieutenant Governor-elect wasnot sworn 

into office in the presence of the senate, over which 
he was to preside; and unless that body caused him 
to take the oath of office at some subsequent period 
when it was in session, a ml caused that fact to bo 
entered on it s journal, 1 here is no legal evidence 
that he ever tool; the oath of office at all. 

"5. At the time the Lieutenant Governor-elect 
returned to the house and assumed to preside over 
a convention of the two houses, when only one was 

present, as the Lieutenant Governor of Alabama, and 
therefore the presiding officer of the senate, the jour- 
nal Of the senate' -hows that body had adjourned 

and that Hon. Mr. Barr was the presiding officer; 
and the house of representatives hail no power to 
decide that another person was the presiding officer 
of t he senate. 

"6. The house of representatives, in order to sus- 
tain thi; proceeding, have caused t heir journal to 
Show, as 1 :un informed, that t he Senate was present 
when the vote tor .M r. Lindsey u as opened and pub- 
lished, in the manner already stated, and when he 
took the oat b of office as Governor. 

"7. The whole proceeding, so biras opening and 
publishing the vote for Governor and treasurer was 
concerned, was in violation and in contempt of the 
injunction which had been granted by one oi the 



14 



supreme judges, "and duly served, and, I may add, 
obeyecfc. so far as the Republican party was con- 
cerned. 

"While these unlawful and revolutionary proceed- 
ings were in progress the capitol and the streets of 
the city were thronged with armed and excited men. 
Threats were made on the street, and communicated 
to Governor Smith, that he would be kicked out of 
the executive chamber and assassinated, lie believed 
that he was legally elected ; he had appealed to the 
courts to assert his right to the office, as every citizen 
of theState may do when reelected to an office which 
he already holds, and he was unwilling to abandon 
the office and the assertion of his right to it by legal 
and peaceable means. Neither was he willing to be 
assaulted and thrust out, and perhaps killed. To 
prevent this United States soldiers were called to 
the capitol, but not to hold the office by force, as has 
been charged, but for the sole purpose of repelling 
force if an attack should be made. The Governor 
had already appealed to the law, and he never did 
resort to anything else, for the purpose of asserting 
his right to the office. He only called on the sheriff 
of Montgomery county, who was present, to protect 
him and the State capitol by means of the United 
States soldiers, as a portion of his posse, from a scene 
of riot and bloodshed, which he had great reason to 
think imminent. That the presence of the sheriff 
and thesoldiers atthecapitol thateveningprevented 
a riot, the consequences of which no one could fore- 
tell, is at least probable. 

"Before the proceedings in the house of repre- 
sentatives terminated which I have described night 
came on. and when the house adjourned the mem- 
bers and the crowd left the State-house. A few 
minutes later Colonel Drum, with four soldiers, re- 
ported to the sheriff of Montgomery county, who 
was at the door of the executive rooms in theeapitol. 
In less than fifteen minutes from that time a messen- 
ger informed Governor Smith that Colonel J. J. Jolly 
was at the door, and would like an interview, to 
which the Governor replied he would receive any 
communication he had to make in writing. He sent 
a communication in writing from Mr. Lindsey, stat- 
ing that he had duly qualified and was ready to enter 
upon the duties of his office, and that he had author- 
ized Colonel Jolly to demand for him and in his 
name take possession of the executive rooms and 
the books and papers of the office. The Governor at 
once penned a reply and sent it out; but Jolly had 
gone." ********* 

"Governor Smith still refused to surrender the 
office to Mr. Lindsey, the senate recognizing Smith, 
and the house Lindsey, as Governor; and this condi- 
tion of affairs continued five orsix days. Meanwhile, 
the Democratic press teemed with the most violent, 
abuse of Governor Smith and his counsel, as also the 
judge who had granted the injunction and the pre- 
sidine; otlicer of the senate who had obeyed it. They 
were denounced as plotters against the peace of the 
State, and threats against the life of the Governor 
were continued." ******* 

" It may be asked, then, how does the matter stand, 
and why did Governor Smith withdraw? I have 
already shown that his friends had great reason to 
fear that bloodshed would be the result of a con- 
tinuance of the contest, because of the violent spirit 
which many of the- Democratic leaders manifested. 
When Governor Smith gave up the contest he pub- 
lished an address to the people, from which I make 
the following extract. He said : 

" 'I have never been willing even to endanger your 
peace and prosperity in an effort to get or keep office 
for myself. It is upon this ground that I now sur- 
render the books, papers, apartments, and parapher- 
nalia of the office of Governor to Hon. 11. B. Lindsey. 
With undiminished confidence in the correctness of 
my claim to that office, upon grounds already known 
to the public, I am convinced that persistence on 
my part in that claim will result in serious evils to 
you, in excitement, in tumult, and perhaps an ap- 
proach to anarchy. I deliberately abandon that 
clniin.' 

" Language moresignificant than this could not bo 
employed. When the paper was prepared from which 
the above was taken it is evident Governor Smith 
expected to be put out of office, if he did not with- 
draw, by force and violence." 

The injunction of Judge Saffold has never 



been dissolved, and Governor Lindsey and 
Treasurer Grant entered upon the discharge of 
the duties of their offices in flagrant violation 
of it. Thus it is seen that Governor Smith 
adhered strictly to the law, while the Democrats 
openly violated and defied it. 

Mr. President, the investigation soon to 
take place will show that had the will of the 
legal voters not been denied expression by 
intimidation, fraud, and violence the Repub- 
lican State ticket would have been elected by 
ten thousand majority. I have seen it charged 
in anonymous communications in newspapers 
that the responsibility of the Republican defeat 
rested upon the President, Governor Smith, 
and myself; upon the President for removing 
the friends of Senator Spencer from office, 
upon Governor Smith as a weak candidate, 
and upon me for supporting Governor Smith's 
nomination. The facts are, that President 
Grant has not removed a single officer in Ala- 
bama since he turned out, with the approval of 
Senator Spencer, the appointees of Andrew 
Johnson. 

As to the wisdom of Governor Smith's re- 
nomination, the facts are as follows: he was 
nominated by acclamation in a State conven- 
tion in which every county in the State was 
represented and of which Senator Spencer was 
a member, and despite his most bitter and 
abusive opposition. He ran ahead of every 
man on the State ticket, and ahead of each 
Republican candidate for Congress in each 
district, and in Senator Spencer's own county, 
notwithstanding Senator Spencer and his par- 
ticular friends did not vote for him ; and ref- 
erence is made to the appointment of my 
brother-in-law, W. B. Woods, as United States 
circuit judge. Now, Senator Spencer's written 
recommendation of Judge Woods for the posi- 
tion is now on file in the office of the Attorney 
General, and his appointment has given uni- 
versal satisfaction to all honest men of all 
parties in his circuit. He is confessedly an 
able and honest judge and a sound Repub- 
lican, though he be my brother-in-law. 

The result of the election in Alabama is due 
mainly to Democratic violence and intimida- 
tion, but supplemented by the just unpopular- 
ity of our candidates for attorney general and 
superintendent of education and the opposi- 
tion of Senator Spencer and his particular 
friends. This much I have deemed it due to 
truth, to the President, to Governor Smith, 
and myself to say. The fact is that the Re- 
publican party of Alabama was crucified in 
the late election between Republican "thieves 
and fools" and Democratic Ku Klux. But 
when the Democratic party shall have purified 
the government of the city and State of New 
York it will be time enough for them to cast 
stones at Republican thieves in Alabama. 

PRESENT CONDITION OF THE SOUTH. 

Mr. President, I desire to speak of the pres- 
ent condition of things in the South. There 
are many things that I deeply deplore. There 
is a spirit of intolerance and bitterness and 



15 



persecution that I lament, and which I have 
done my best, to assuage. If the honorable 
Senator from Missouri and his party associates 
had been us kindly in all their declarations as 1 
have been : it' they bad sought as earnest I)' as 1 
ba re to make peace, and bad refrained as dili- 
gently as I have from using harsh words, I 
think we might have had a happier condition 
of tilings in the South than we now have. 
There is a spirit, of intolerance and bitterness 
toward, not only Republicans of doubtful char- 
acter, but toward all Republicans, which is 
exceedingly deplorable and reprehensible, and 
from which come the outrages upon person 
and property which the Senate committee are 
now investigating, and which are a disgrace 
and a shame, not only to the Democratic party, 
but to the country. I shall not trespass upon 
that ground, because I doubt not the report of 
the committee will bring the facts before the 
Si Dale and the country in a much belter and 
more authoritative form than 1 can. 

1 shall content myself with quoting a little 
Democratic testimony on this point, and [ 
hope that in so doing I shall not be accused 
by Democratic Senators of abusing the people 
whom 1 represent. I introduce it here to show 
the spirit and aim of the southern Democracy 
as well as the existence of an organization 
which tramples under fool all law and all rights, 
and commits the most horrible crimes — facts 
which demand the instant attention of the 
General Government and a summary remedy. 

The Mobile Tribune of August 10. 1869, 
contained an editorial article, from which i 
extract, the following: 

uch villains want pence, and declared that 
if they get not peaci the} will have" action.' It we 
wriggle whilo they draw our eye-teeth they will pin 
u- down with the bayonet. Unfortunately for them 
it takes two tn make that arrangement, tf the war 
invoked in tin; above extract dees come, and the 
scoundrels who now demand it have deliberately 
planted its seeds, not one of them will live to see its 
lu ion. We in such an event may be anally 
crushed under the strong ana of the dictatorial 
power ai Washington, but not before we shall have 
I he villains who brought the calamity upon us 
to a realm wdiere they will find no I une to exult, over 
such a consummation. Let them remember that." 

The following is from the same paper of 
August '.i. 1869 : 

"Had these men been dealt with as were Dostie 
ami It Sew Orleans, we would now 

have the assurance of peace in the community tor 
some time to come." 

The Montgomery Mail of November 17, 1870, 
said, in speaking of Governor Smith's course 
in contesting the election : 

"Are we to have revolution? When the torm 
which the tyrants and usurpers have raised gathers 
from the four corner- of Ala! una anil bursts m it- 
fury, t ill upon the bead of the innocenl 

dupes! bet it fall upon the heads of those who have 
invited and defied it ! 

The Montgomery Advertiser lately contained 
the following editorial remarks; and let it be 
rememben d thai the Advertiser is one of the 

most conservative Democratic papers in the 

South, and is edited by a gentleman of high 

character and fine culture. Mr. Robert Tyler : 

"Of course lawlessness and crime will be rampant 



so long as the Radical party exists, and this, not only 
in the South, but throughout the whole country. The 
Rfl I' a I pat i\ is its If, in its spirit and purposes, the 
imbodimentof lawli ncs and crime, and we are not 

Mii e the t ime has not come when some of the Radical 
li il as, by way of example, should he male to 
expatiate their crimes in the face of the whole 
ry by some punishment appropriate to their 
offenses." 

The same paper recently contained the fol- 
lowing : 

" The funding scheme of the last session has failed, 
but not for the reason.- the Secretary supposes. It 
has failed because there has been a secret disposition 
on the part of i ho masses of the people to repudiati 
the whole of the civil war debt. And although wo 
'1 t propose to agitate this question, still it is our 

opinion that, this enormous, ami in a great measure 
dishonest debt, under which the nation is groaning, 
is and will he, as long as it stand.-, a monument of 

shame to call the at I en t ion of the world to a great 
scandal m the history of the United Stales; ami we 

knowof no species of properly thai deserves in this 
country less respect than these perfidious and blood- 
stained bonds. Besides, have not the people seen 

tine'- hill ions of property in the southern States con- 
fiscated for the honor, peace, ami prosperity of the 
nation, and hundreds of million- taken without one 
ci'ii i of compensation in lour ' loyal ' Slates with the 
same beneficent intent! Why, then, should not an 
odious ami oppre-.-i\ o debt owed by a comparatively 
small class of individuals be disposed of in the same 
manner and on the same high principal '.'" 

* * ,;. :■: .i * :■: :?. i: * 

"In truth a. large proportion of the body of the 
northern and western voters have already discovered, 
or are beginning to discover, two things to the reverse 
of what they were taught to believe for many years, 
ami this much to their amazement, namely : 

First, that t he recent civil war in itself, in the edu- 
cational ideas leading to it, and in its consequences, 
was both a blunder and a crime; and that history 
must inevitably so write it. down, struggle as they 
may to avert the moral and political consequences 
of the terrible and in fa mo us scandal. 

"Second, that the leaders of the Republican or 
Radical-party itself, hut, little better in temper and 
principle than a mob, were and an- a set. of mere 
politicians, and the most selfish and corrupt t- r aUK 
of taughtand untaught knaves by whom a bad cause 
was ever served, or any country led into a vortex of 
dire misfortunes or to the brink of an awful gulf of 
ruin from which only the most skillful efforts can now 

save it. 

"Of course society seldom or never confesses its 
errors, and never its crimes. It would he expecting 
too much of poor human nature to hope that the 
chosen leaders of the Radical imih thai terrorized 
the North and West in 1860, or any considerable 
portion of the dupe- composing that mob, will make 
an open and literal confession before the world either 
of folly or criminality ; hut it is nevertheless evident 

to our percept ion that the masses of the i pie begin 

to see how they were irritated, deceived, inflamed, 
and finally ensnared by those vile influences which 
precipitated the mosl wanton and unnecessary civil 
war that ever saturated tie- soil of a country with 
the common blood of its children." 

The same paper, in its issue of 23d Febru- 
ary, in speaking of the late war. says: 
"In that greal contest we believe the cause of tho 

southern Slates was wholly right, that of the Rad- 
ical party North and West wholly wrens. We. how- 
ever, have accepted tacts and destinies, and have 

dot ur best tor our people, not reaching after 

impossibilities, hut trying to give shape to what 
ma:, he practically for our benefit in the present and 
iii'-- 1 likely to jive us power in such struggles as the 
future may bring for: a." 

'fin- Shelby county I Alabama) Guide, a Dem- 
ocratic paper, recently said : 

"The latest K'n Klu.x outrages arc of a horrible 
cha rai ter, rpel i ated upon I he persons 

of two negroi in Jacl on .The 

battle cry of the Democracy in the late canvass was, 



16 



"law and order,' and against the 'fools and thieves' 
in power. Governor Lindsey has been installed in his 
office now nearly two months, within which time a 
number of these cold-blooded murders have been 
committed, and all the victims, except perhaps one, 
were negroes ; yet not in one single instance, except 
the murder of the white man, Amos G. Harris, in 
the city of Montgomery, right under the nose of the 
Governor, has there been a single reward offered 
by his Excellency for the perpetrators of these dia- 
bolical deeds. In our own county, in the enlight- 
ened community of Montevallo, where ' Lindsey and 
reform ' received 412 out of 422 votes cast, at least 100 
of them negroes, one of these horrible murders has 
been committed and no notice taken of it, except by 
the employer of the negro, who offered a reward of 
$300, through the columns of the Selma Times, for 
testimony sufficient to convict the parties engaged in 
the affair: and except this advertisement and a six- 
line editorial in the Times, calling attention to the 
advertisement, this horrible affair received nonotice 
at the hands of the press of the State except through 
the columns of the Selma Argus and Montgomery 
Advertiser. 

"Our opinion is that a few thousand dollars in 
rewards for these murderers would bring some of 
them up dangling at the end of a rope, and would 
have a tendency to stop their outrages and, perhaps, 
put an end to Parsons's reconstruction. But strange 
to say, some of the Democratic press of Alabama, 
instead of rebuking these crimes, encourage them 
either by silence or innuendo, and even to-day some 
of them are, in an indirect manner, pointing Par- 
sons out as a good subject for one of these outrages. 

"If the Democratic party mean peace and 'law 
and order,' let them begin at once to bring it about — 
Governor Lindsey by offering suitable rewards for 
the perpetrators of these crimes, and the press de- 
nouncing them in the severest terms." 

The following is from a recent number of 
the Charleston (South Carolina) News, Dem- 
ocratic: 

" In common with the great mass of the law-abid- 
ing people of South Carolina, we deeply deplore the 
murderous outrages which have been committed in 
Union county by the so-called Ku Klux Klan. These 
outlaws, there is good reason to believe, are chiefly 
from Georgia and North Carolina, but some of them 
are Union county men. They have made themselves 
the judge and jury. They gave to the miserable pris- 
oners nn opportunity of saying a word in their de- 
fense. It may be that the action of the marauders 
was precipitated by the rumor that the prisoners in 
jail were about to be removed to Columbia, where 
they might hope for a partial trial and a speedy 
acquittal. This, however, is no excuse for the das- 
tardly crime of their self-constituted executioners. 
_ " There is no justification whatever for the down- 
right murders in Union county committed by the 
disguised desperadoes who call themselves KuKlux. 
They are neither more nor less than murderers, and 
it is demanded that they be brought at once to the 
bar of justice, or scourged beyond the limits of the 
State. Their conduct is as foolish as it. is intrinsic- 
ally wrong. They are playing directly into the 
hands of our bitter political foes. We have had 
already long years of tyranny and oppression, 
brought about by the violence or stupidity of mis- 
guided men, who would redress all their wrongs by 
the bludgeon of the bully or the rifle of the assassin. 
Unless we would go back to the inchoate condition 
with which reconstruction made the State familiar, 
the recurrence of the Union outrages must at once 
be made impossible. 

"To send negro militia into the up-country, ex- 
cited as the people are, is to hurry them to destruc- 
tion. A detachment oj United States troops could, 
however, prevent KuKlux outrages, and would have 
the moral support of all good citizens. As it is, a 
gang of desperadoes and reckless boys strike a terri- 
ble blow at the peace and prosperity of the State." 

The Abbeville (South Carolina) Press, Dem- 
ocratic, recently said, in speaking of the doings 
of the Ku Klux in that State : 

"All good citizens must unite in denouncing them 
as evil, and only evil, as increasing tenfold the 



troubles they seek to remedy. They are neither 
to be justified, excused, nor palliated. They are 
alike lawless, unauthorized, and impolitic. Lawless 
they are, because they transgress the highest obliga- 
tions which we owe to God and man ; unauthorized, 
because they involve, without their consent, a 
whole community in the bitter consequences of the 
actof arecklessfew; impolitic, because theyinaugu- 
rate areign of violence which is destructive of every 
interest of society. 

"Better the veriest despotism which ever crushed 
out the spirit of a free people than this lawless 
anarchy, which makes the lives and property of the 
citizen the sport of every reckless marauder. Be- 
tween such a state of things and the military we 
choose the latter. Sooner than this, let the State be 
remanded to the territorial condition, or governed 
as a conquered province by the strong arm of mili- 
tary law." 

The Selma (Alabama) Argus, a Democratic 
paper, lately published the following: 

Sir: I see from your article in your last issue (Jan- 
uary 27) that you accuse a body of disguised men of 
going to Greensborough, on Tuesday last, and releas- 
ing a man from thejailinthatplace who had been con- 
fined for horse-stealing. We inform you, sir, that your 
author has told a malicious falsehood. The man who 
was released on that evening was not confined for 
horse-stealing, but for killing a negro and the tak- 
ing of a Yankee's horse (openly) that it might enable 
him to make his escape from a court (like Black- 
ford's) of injustice: and we say to you, sir, that the 
party did not visitGreensborough on that evening for 
the purpose of releasing this man McCrary, but for 
the purpose of catching and giving Mr. Blackford 
what he lawfully deserves and will get before the 
1st day of March. We do not communicate to you 
for the purpose of clearing ourselves of but one thing, 
and that is the release of a horse-thief. Sir, it is not 
our object to release thieves, but, on the other hand, 
it is our sworn duty to bring them all to justice, and 
we in this section of country intend aud will see that 
all thieves shall be punished to the extent of the law, 
and in cases where the law cannot reach them the 
party that released the man in Greensborough will 
give them all they deserve, aud perhaps a little more. 

Yours, truly, <fcc, 

K. W. C. 
To the Editor of the Argus. 

P. S. — The writer is a subscriber to your paper, and 
would be pleased to see this and an additional article 
by you in your next issue. K. 

Alabama, January 31, 1871. 

COMMENTS. 

" Our version of the affair at Greensborough was 
based upon the statement of the Greensborough Bea- 
con, and the reports telegraphed to the press. The 
author of the above letter corrects our errors. Mc- 
Crary was onlyguiltyof 'killing' anegro and 'tak- 
ing' a. horse. The object of the disguised men was 
not to release a horse-thief, but to lynch a probate 
judge. This is the version of one who claims to have 
been of the party of disguised men whose conduct 
on the occasion in question was an example of law- 
lessness and has already brought evil upon the inno- 
cent victims of the incendiary fires provoked by it." 

The Courier-Journal, of Louisville, Ken- 
tucky, the ablest Democratic paper of the 
South, only this week boldly and patriotically 
said, in speaking of the Ku Klux : 

" They have usurped the powers of government; 
made murder their pastime and terrorism theirscep- 
ter ; conferred upon their adherents the right of pri- 
vate vengeance, and assumed to protect them from 
the penalties of outraged law. No homeissafe.no 
place is sacred from their invasions. To show their 
strength and their uttercontempr for all departments 
of the State government they fill the vicinity of the 
capital during the brief period of the legislative ses- 
sion with deeds of blood, and carry their lawless 
violence with insulting defiance to the very doors of 
our legislative halls. This stain upon the escutcheon 
of Kentucky, this humiliation of our proud State, 
has culminated under a Democratic State adminis- 
tration; and yet the Legislature, so prompt to resent 



17 



a newspaper censure, has affected to ignore the facts 

and disregard the disgrs 

* + # * * * * * * * 

"A few days since we observed that the lack of vigor 
on our part tends to encourage lawlessness. I thi 
nol an example in point? Do we not see thai our 
outlawry is enlarging its sphere and growing more 
ing as we fail to meet it wil li acts propor- 
tioned to its force and extent? Hot a fortnight ago 

town upon tio' postal serv ice of thi 
Government in broad daylight, and one of our most 
public highways narrowly escaped a wanton mur- 
der. A train guard of soldier- is the consequence. 
Now, it rides into the capital of the State, overcomes 
the police that watch the rest of our legisl itors, our 
Governors, our judges, and all our Commonwealth 
authorities, seizes a prison, releases a murderer, and 
rides oil' in triumph." 

The Rome (Georgia) Commercial recently 
deprecates the bold acts of the Kit Klux, and 
gaya their outrages will lose tin; Democratic 
party thousands of votes in 1H7L\ It therefore 
advises quiet for the present. It says: 

" Remember, brothers, that the strengl h and power 
of any secret organization rests in the attribute of 
mystery and hidden force, and in the fact that upon 
the thousand hills of our country a legion of brave 
hearts that are throbbing quietly can be called to- 
gether by a tiny signal, and when the work is done 
can melt away into shadowy nothing. Every t Line you 
act you weaken your strength. Then, be quiet. If an 
inexorable necessity cal is for action, act promptly, 
with decision, and do nothing more than is absolutely 
necessary." 

The military committee of the present Ken- 
tucky Legislature proposed that $500,000 be 
appropriated "to ferret out the perpetrators 
of the cowardly outrages perpetrated by un- 
known and disguised parties;" and its chair- 
man pledges "every confederate soldier to 
speak with a voice that cannot be mistaken, 
that law and order, and the peace and dignity 
of the State must be maintained," that, "out- 
lawry must be wiped out, even if in the blood 
of the perpetrators." And here a painful 
contrast is suggested to my mind. While the 
confederate general, Breckinridge, before a 
Senator, denounces the Kti Kltix as murder- 
ers and outlaws, the Federal general, now a 
Senator from Missouri, litis uttered no word 
of disapproval. 

The Senator from Ohio [Mr. Thtjrman] did 
utter these brave, useful words ; and I honor 
him for so doing, notwithstanding his harsh 
words about my party : 

"'.Mr. President, I have never uttered one word 
of defense in favor of Ku Klux organizations. The 
ite will bear ine witness that no one spoke 
more strongly against them than 1 did at the last 
session. If 1 were looking at the subject simply in 
a partisan point of view, I am no as not 

to know that every outbreak of that kind only injures 
the party to which 1 belong, only furnishes the mate- 
rial for our opponents to excite the passions of the 
le and excite t he •-. 1 know 

it full well; audit my voice could reach every man 
who violates the law in the South, and could have 
potential influence with him, it would be addressed 
to him in three simple word-, 'obey the laws.' 
Sin-h are my feelings; such are my natui 
and such is my interest and 
to whi'-h 1 belong. There is no, Inn/ to be 
by us by outrages, which -oily furnish our adversa- 
ries witii pre i ex ts for passing acts of legislation that 

but a. tew years ago would li 

of liberty, of freedom, and of constitutional law that 
had an abiding place in the American heart." 

If all the Democratic Senators on this floor 



and the Democratic Representatives in the 
other Bou e, instead of seeking to deny or 
palliate all intolerance and violence at the 
South, would boldly denounce them, they 
would do the country a service. The Senator 
from Ohio is the only Democratic Senator 
who has thus spoken. 1 wish the Senator from 
Missouri would use his mighty influence with 
hi* political friends at the South, not to excite 
:md inflame passion, hut to restrain ami calm 
it down. His voice would ho potent for peace 
as it has been for disturbance. If the Demo- 
cratic representatives in this Chamber and in 
the other House would with one voice boldly 
say to their political friends at the South, 
"You must stop this violence and proscription 
for political differences," they would stop it. 
Their influence would he effective in aid of 
peace, ami I hope it may be patriotically 
exercised in that way. 

While I do not charge the whole body of the 
southern people with responsibility for these 
Outrages, 1 do say that they are responsible 
for not crushing them out by creating a de- 
termined public opinion that shall make the 
civil law powerful to arrest and punish crim- 
inals. There is a great body of good men at 
the South who deplore this violence and pro- 
scription, but they have not yet made their 
influence effectively felt. I hope that all good 
men may come to the point of aiding to put an 
end to both. 

Sir, the language "which I shall read, coming 
from a man whom I know to have been a brave 
Union soldier, and who is an honest, good cit- 
izen, is enough to stir the blood of every hon- 
est American citizen. He writes me, under a 
very recent date: 

"I feel a little mortified, to say nothing of tho 
anger that, rises, when 1 think that I. after fighting 
for the 'old flag ' when it was tottering, should bo 
forced to leave any portion of the laud over which 

it waves on at unl of my fidelity to her many stars 

nod -tripes. But such is the ease : "to lea ve or die ' 
was their motto." 

I tell Senators from my personal knowledge 
that in the county in which he lived his life 
was not safe, and to save it, he was obliged to 
leave. That is true of that county. It is not 
by any means true of all nor of a majority of 
the counties in the State of Alabama. He 
lived in the town of Eutaw, where the scene 
occurred which ! described the other day, 
and where 1 was denied in 1868 the right of 
speech. If it ever happens toth ■ Senator from 
Missouri, as I hope it never may, to experience 
the pain of being denied tin- right to express 
his political opinions, lie will find how hard 
it is for an American citizen, and particularly 
for one who has been a soldier, to submit to it. 

When I attempted to make a mild, calm, 
conciliatory speech, such as I always make, I 
found an armed mob who denied me the right ; 
ami when, from a natural and just indignation 
which arose in my heart that J should be de- 
nied a right guarantied to me by the Constitu- 
tion of my country, I .-aid that I would speak 
there if it took a thousand soldiers to protect 



18 



me, the mob told me! "Bringon yonrFederal 
soldiers and we will butcher them!" Such 
things are a shame and a disgrace to the coun- 
try. Does the Senator from Missouri agree 
with me? 

But, sir, the great difficulty about this vio- 
lence in the South, as the committee and the 
Senate will find, is that, it, comes from an organ- 
ization which extends throughout the southern 
States. If we only had to deal with sporadic 
cases of crime, that occur from individual pas- 
sion or excitement, it would be comparatively 
a trifling matter. It is the fact that there is an 
organization made up of the worst material in 
the country, the same material out of which 
mobs are made everywhere, whose main object 
is to control elections, that makes violence so 
general and so audacious, and renders it im- 
possible to suppress it and to enforce the law 
against the perpetrators. It is not, let Sena- 
tors understand, the brave confederate soldiers 
who mainly compose this organization. The 
best and boldest men of the confederate army 
have nothing to do with it. The editors of 
newspapers in the South, above all other men, 
are responsible for creating bitterness of feel- 
ing and for disseminating prejudices and ex- 
citing passions out of which comes violence, 
and they are not the men whom the Senator 
from Missouri and myself met upon the field 
of battle. They are either men who were not 
soldiers at all or who have no record as such 
of which they can be proud. 

PEACE. 

But, Mr. President, I want peace, and have 
preached it from the end of the war. I have 
steadily opposed all confiscation and proscrip- 
tion because of rebellion, and I have never 
said a word which could grate harshly upon 
the ears of an honorable confederate soldier. 
In a speech which I made at Huntsville, Ala- 
bama, last fall, and which was widely circulated 
by the Republican State committee, I said: 

'But the bigoted sectionalism of the action of the 
Democratic convention shall not change my course. 
Beaten, baffled, and ruined, as is the Democratic 
party of Alabama and the Union, I can afford to 
overlook its illiberality, and I shall continue to 
labor zealously for universal amnesty as tending to 
the peace and prosperity of my country. The high- 
est purpose of my heart is that, all the citizens of my 
country shall have the peaceful enjoyment of equal 
rights and that they shall be bound together in the 
indissoluble bonds of fraternal love. 

" Proud, as I justly am, of the humble part which 
I bore in the struggle for the Union and liberty, I 
have never sought to punish the confederate soldier 
for the part he took against the Government. I 
have been and am willing and anxious that by-gones 
shall be by-gones, and want the Government to for- 
give all political offenses, however unjustifiable. I 
cannot justify, but I can forgive rebellion. 'Ven- 
geance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.' I will 
forgive, and leave to ' Him who doeth all things 
well' to judge us, and to mete out to all their just 
deserts. I sympathize as deeply as any man can 
with the people of the South in those sorrows which 
the war brought upon them, and I wish to do all 
that lies in my power to heal its wounds and repair 
its ravages. I cannot make full allowance for the 
feelings of wounded pride and deep humiliation 
which the leaders in secession felt at their defeat 
and ruin. All this I have considered and felt, and 
while I have been, and shall continue to be, firmly 



and steadfastly true to the great principles of Union 
liberty, and equality, which inspired our armies' 
and which it is the mission of the Republican party 
to make real and practical, yet I have spoken no 
word since Appomattox which could justly wound 
the tenderest sensibility of any honorable, brave 
confederate soldier. I fought under my country's 
banner for results — the results of Union, liberty, and 
peace, not for the gratification of any personal ani- 
mosity, for I had none. Union and liberty have 
been secured, and there remains to be obtained only 
peace and good-will. To this end all my efforts have 
been directed since 1865, and for this end I speak 
to-day. 

"I respect the bravery and skill of the confederate 
soldier, though deeming him in the wrong. He vin- 
dicated his sincerity with his heart's best blood. He 
fought a brave fight, and was beaten, as I think he 
ought to have been. The issues which arrayed us 
against each other have been settled by the God of 
battles. Under the stars and stripes I offer him the 
hand of fellowship and friendship, and would extend 
to him all the political rights and privileges which 
I myself enjoy. I ask him to accept the olive-branch 
which I tender, and to join in giving equal rights to 
all, and in giving peace and prosperity to our State 
and country. 

"General Grant's administration ought to be the 
pride of every American citizen. Honesty, econ- 
omy, and fidelity pervade every department of it. 
Why cannot we support it? Abandoning strife, 
according to all the rights we claim for ourselves, not 
seeking to turn backward on the dial of progress, or 
to reopen settled questions, only to get the same 
results after much strife and bitterness, why stand 
and rail at doom and fight destiny by seeking to hin- 
der the success of republicanism? Why not leave 
the past to bury its dead, and turn our faces and our 
steiis toward the future, which beckons us so kindly, 
and which holds in its hands such rich gifts? 

" One word more and I am done. Crime and out- 
lawry disgrace some small sections of the State. 
Disguised men commit deeds of violence and mur- 
der, which cry to Heaven for punishment. These 
crimes paralyze industry, check immigration, keep 
away capital, and demand swift punishment: and I 
appeal to the solid good citizens of our State to rise 
in their might, and, through the majesty of adcterm- 
ined public opinion, enforce the law. Do not allow 
the State or national Government to be tempted too 
far by the continuance of violence. These crimes 
must and will be stopped. The responsibility rests 
upon the substantial citizens of the State to create a 
public opinion which shall make the civil law effect- 
ive to protect life and property. Let no one be silly 
enough to 'hink that any political party can be ben- 
efited by violence. It will ruin any party in any 
State that abets it. Elections carried by violence 
and terror are no elections, and will be so regarded. 
Let us agree to disagree on questions of political 
policy, but let us all preach ' peace and good-will to 
men,' standing on the grandest platform yet given, 
' Do unto others as ye would others should do unto 
you.'" 

PEACE AND JUSTICE. 

Yes, Mr. President, I want peace, but with 
injustice. I would imitate nature. My path- 
way from my home to this Capitol lies over 
one continual battle-field, nine hundred miles 
long, and I observe with pleasure that the 
rains and frosts and dews are aiding the indus- 
try of man to smooth down the rugged outlines 
and sharp angles of forts and fortifications, 
while her vines and flowers seek to hide the 
evidences of strife. So would I, by kindly 
and liberal legislation toward the South, and 
by kindly words, seek to turn away wrath and 
make peace. The Union men and Republicans 
of the South only ask for toleration of political 
opinion and action ; and this we have a right 
to demand, and this it is the duty of the Gov- 
ernment to guaranty us. While we pray for 
peace we are asked to pay too dearly for it. 



19 



Mr. President and Senators, Iain for peace : 
but if peace can only be had on condition of 
digging up and casting out the bones of our 
dead soldiers from the graves where the nation 
has buried them, and which have been strewn 
with flowers by a grateful people, and wel with 
the tears of widows, mothers, and orphans ; 
of not only forgiving the rebel, but of asking 
his forgiveness for having been a Union man : 
of putting the gray above the blue, the stars 
and bars over the stars and stripes, of repudi 
ation of the national debt, of denial of free 
speech and freedom of political action, of put- 
; the negro in a condition of serfdom, then 
the old issues are raised, and I am not for such 
a peace. I am willing to bury the gray and 
the stars and bars, and that their friends shall 
drop their tears on their graves without re- 
proach from me ; and 1 can add my respect for 
the courage of the brave men who died for 
these, and I can share my sympathies for the 
sorrowing widows, orphans, and maimed men 
with which the rebellion rilled the whole land — 
with all, whether of the blue or the gray : but 
buried must be the stars and bars, while the 
stars and stripes must float forever, and under 
them must be liberty and justice. 

If pictures are to be hung in legislative halls 
to commemorate the heroes of the war and to 
suggest to the rising generation examples for 
follow, they must be pictures of Thomas, 
not of Lee; of the Virginian who stood by his 
country's flag in the hour of peril, not of him 
who deserted it. 

My land is the water-bound Republic ; my 
gods are the gods of my fathers — Union, Lib- 
erty, .lustice — and I can submit to no dismem- 
berment of the one, no dethronement of the 
others. The orange groves of Florida, the 
snows of Maine, the cotton fields of Texas, 
and the golden glories of California, as well 
as the great central heart of the country, are 
alike dear to me; and I embrace them all 
in a common love, and demand that every- 
where shall be maintained and secured pro- 
tection to life, property, and constitutional 
rights. 

To secure this result, without which free 
government is a failure, many of the State gov- 
ernments in the lately rebellious districts are 
powerless, because the agencies and organiza- 
tions which disturb the peace of society and 
defiantly trample upon the dearest rights of 
the citizen are sustained by the controlling 
public opinion of those States. This is as 
true of Democratic Kentucky as of Republican 
South Carolina. Alexander Hamilton wisely 
foresaw that the hope and safety of this coun- 



try were not in the power of its subdivisions 
or States, but in the whole people of the country 
as a nation. Bence he favored giving strength 
to the central General Government, and held 
thai the rights of the people were above State 
rights. His prediction has been fully verified 
by the events of the last ten years. 

The people of some of the States sought to 
subvert the Government and divide the country. 
The nation crushed rebellion and saved the 
Government and the country. And now, while 
crime and outlawry are able to hold high car- 
nival in some of the States, because supported 
by a local public opinion, which makes local 
governments powerless to check, the public 
sentiment of the country at large is sound and 
healthful, and the General Government is pow- 
erful to sustain and enforce its laws. In these 
is now our hope, and to these I now appeal, in 
behalf of the loyal, law-abiding citizens of the 
States of North Carolina, South Carolina, Flor- 
ida, Georgia, Alabama. Mississippi, Tennessee, 
Arkansas, Louisiana, Kentucky, and Texas for 
protection. 

We have given freedom and political rights 
to the late slaves of the South, and have thus 
robbed them of the sympathy and protection 
which self-interest induced their late masters 
to give them. They are now being ground 
between the upper and the nether mill-stone. 
Shall we fail to rescue them, and to protect 
them in the rights which the nation has given 
them? Shall we fail to protect the loyal white 
men of the South in their rights of life, prop- 
erty, and ballot? If we do, then reconstruc- 
tion is a failure and the rebellion has half 
triumphed. No, Mr. President, the people of 
this country will not allow it. Let Congress and 
the President act quickly, boldly, decisively, 
and make the flag guaranty to every citizen 
at home, that ample protection in his just 
rights which it carries on every sea, and con- 
tinent, and island of the globe, and the peo- 
ple will firmly and patriotically sustain their 
action. No man can clearly foresee all the evil 
consequences of failure to thus act. I can see 
plainly foreshadowed as the results of failure, 
the nullification of the fifteenth amendment, 
the reduction of the negro at the South to a 
serfdom nearly as bad as slavery, the repudi- 
ation of the national debt, the payment, for 
slaves and of the confederate war debt either 
by theGeneral Government or the States. Let 
us and the country be warned in time, that 
we may avert the evils which threaten us, 
and that the Republic, through justice and 
peace, may sweep on to its grand destiny of 
the future. 



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